coin and bullion in Europe, in 1847, at about $1,250,000,000. Ruggles estimated the stock of gold coin alone in the commercial world, in 1867, at $2,600,000,000, and Ernest Seyd estimated it at the same amount in 1872. In May, 1876, also, before a select committee of parliament, Mr. Seyd estimated the total stock of gold in circulation in the current year at the enormous figure of $3,750,000,000, of which he appor has been greatest since the production of gold has diminished, as will be seen by the following table of the amounts of specie in each of the three great banks at different periods in the eighteen months to July, 1876, (the amounts are given in their equivalents in United States money). tioned $1,300,000,000 to France, $650,000,000 to Great Britain and 150,000,000 to the United States. Mr. Seyd's estimate of the gold in the United States is based on the estimate of the director of the United States Mint for June 30, 1875, which was $167,000,000 for the total amount of gold and silver coin and bullion in the United States at that date; but even in this estimate the director of the Mint stated that no deduction had been made for the amount of gold consumed in the arts for two years. This estimate also allowed $10,000,000 of actual gold coin and bullion as being held by the national banks, which is unquestionably too large an estimate. It is therefore apparent that Mr. Seyd's estimate of $150,000,000 of gold in the United States is about $50,000,000 too large, and I think his allowances to Great Britain and France are overestimates in about the same ratio. Seyd estimated the stock of gold coin alone in the commercial world, in 1872, at $2,600,000,000, and before 1848 at $2,000,000,000. Ruggles estimated the world's stock of gold coin in 1867, at $2,600,000. These estimates seem to be the merest conjectures, without any thorough investigation, and the method by which Mr. Seyd and others have arrived at their present estimates of the amount of gold in circulation is to add 75 per cent of the presumed production of gold in the world since the dates mentioned. Chevalier estimated the total of gold in its various forms of coin, bullion and personal ornaments, in the world, in 1848, at about $2,830,000,000, and various other accepted authorities estimated the amount of gold coin and bullion in Europe, in 1847, at about $1,250,000,000. All these estimates are, however, open to the criticism that, first, they were made without any investigation of the financial condition of different countries of the world, or even of Europe; second, that they were not made upon the basis of any rule of wealth in each of the countries; that each later estimate has been made. upon the presumption that the earlier ones were correct and that the only thing to be done was to add the 75 per cent of the estimated product of the mines. It is by this method of conjecture piled upon conjecture that men have contrived to arrive at the estimate of $3,750,000,000 of gold in use as money in the world at the present time. But it is in vain that they attempt to apportion it out to the respective countries, the sum is too large to admit of apportionment. If in the inquiry as to where this presumed immense sum of gold used as money is distributed we turn to our own part of the world, we find on the continent of North America a total population of about 56,000,000 in 1875. Of this total there was in the United States say 42,000,000, in Canada 4,000,000 and in Mexico 9,000,000. We know that the total of gold coin and gold bullion in the United States at the close of that year did not much exceed $100,000,000. The population of Canada, in 1875, was estimated at a little over 4,000,000. The total revenue raised in 1874 was $24,205,000, or at the rate of $6.05 per capita. Assuming this to be in accordance with the rules applied to other countries, viz., 33 per cent of the money in circulation and in banks, it would give an aggregate of $72,600,000 of all kinds of money, or at the rate of $18.15 per capita. The circulation of the Canadian banks on December 31, 1875, was $25,412,321, leaving a presumed aggregate of $47,200,000 in all sorts of coin. There is a mint in each of the eight States of Mexico, and the aggregate coinage of these in the fiscal year 1872-3 was $20,374,554, of which $19,686,434 was silver coins, leaving only $668,120 of gold. The total coinage of 1869-70 was $20,677,021, with the same ratio of gold and silver, and in that year the total export of coin from Mexico was $17,479,014. Comparing these facts with similar ones for the various States of Europe, we should not expect to find in the whole of Mexico an aggregate of more than $40,000,000 of all kinds of coin, of which at least $35,000,000 would be silver. According to the latest statistics the total population of South America and the West Indies aggregates about 29,000,000, of which 10,000,000 are in Brazil, 4,000,000 in the West Indies, and nearly 5,000,000 in Peru. Of the 10,000,000 population of Brazil nearly or about one third are either savage nomadic tribes or persons recently manumitted from slavery under the act for gradual emancipation passed in 1871, and the proportion of the population using any kind of money to any considerable extent is not above 7,000,000 or 8,000,000. But the fact in connection with Brazil most pertinent to our present inquiry is that coin of any kind has for many years been almost entirely banished by the use of inconvertible paper money. Shortly after the first great increase of paper money in 1856-7 the entire monetary circulation of the empire was made the subject of careful investigation, the result of which was the following statement of all kinds of money in circulation in the empire at the close of 1857, viz.: Government notes Notes of Bank of Brazil Gold, silver and copper coins 43,000,000 millreis." 49,667,450 5,000,000 97,667,450 millreis. In 1858 the Bank of Brazil made an ineffectual attempt to resume specie payments, and by 1865 the total of bank and government notes was reduced to an aggregate of 75,000,000 millreis. But in consequence of the Paraguayan war, which ended in 1870, the Brazilian government increased its issues of inconvertible paper money 122,000,000 millreis, and in 1875 the monetary circulation of the empire was stated as follows, viz.: Notes of the Banks of Brazil, Maranham, Per nambuco and Bahia.. Gold, silver and copper, estimated. .159,000,000 millreis. 38,000,000 The total paper money circulation of Brazil was therefore equal to $52,204,230 in United States money in 1857, and increased to $106,380,000 by 1871, while the total coin circulation amounted to the insignificant sums of $2,700,000 in 1857 and $3,500,000 in 1871, at about which it has remained since. The State of Paraguay was rendered totally bankrupt by the war with Brazil, and there can be but little coin of any kind in circulation. The Argentine Republic resorted in 1866 to the issue of government treasury notes in denominations of $5, $10, $20, $50 and $100, and these have largely displaced coin of any kind. * This word is the plural of real, and one real in Brazilian money is about half a mill. In Portuguese coin, however, it is about one mill. The modern Brazilian milréis (written 18000, one thousand reis) is equal to 54% cents in gold. The Portuguese millreis is worth about double that of Brazil. |